Fred of the Dead
by redwallanderson
Summary: A story about a man, Fred Bauker. Just a simple man, surviving in the world ruled by zombies.


Fred Bauker was a regular guy, just someone that you would pass on the street and forget his face two seconds later. And that's what people like Fred counted on. Because people like Fred needed to be inconspicuous. It was in their nature. For Fred, he needed to be unmemorable because he could pass through crowds without really being noticed. But when the dead rose, that changed. He was noticed all the time -- by undead creatures, albeit, but noticed, just the same.

Like, for instance, now. Fred was being noticed by a particular zombie, a male wearing a green sweater-vest and sweatpants and big strapping boots like a cowboy. He almost looked normal -- well, except for his right eye hanging out by the nerve and oh, not to mention the huge hole in his stomach, eh? Fred raised his 9mm pistol and placed a bullet in the zombie's forehead, knocking it backwards to sprawl on the pavement, dead for the second time in it's life.

"Bitch," he muttered, and spat on the body, before moving on across the parking lot of the supermarket Lunch-and-Munch in the small West Virginia town of Goronville. It might as well have been called Podunk, or -- better yet, Deliverance. "Inbred motherfuckers," Fred said quietly as he saw that the glass front doors to the Lunch-and-Munch were locked. "I can remedy that sitiation," he said, and with a grin raised the 9mm again and shattered the glass with one solid bullet.

He stepped through the broken doors and confronted a supermarket full of zombies. Now, these weren't your regular daily shoppers. These mofuckers were gross, to say the least. And Fred suddenly wasn't in the eating mood. But he was in the zombie-killing mood, though. "Come on, let's dance," he said, raising his 9mm for the first time in as many minutes and getting ready to start his zombie-slaughtering in earnest.

Fred grinned as he shot the first zombie, dressed in only some long underwear that had flopped open to reveal his rotting . . . parts. The bullet blew its face off, putting the poor creature out of its mercy by killing it for the second time. The zombie toppled back and knocked over a small shelf full of expired potato chips bags, Skittles, and candy bars, and the like. Fred grinned again as he grabbed up some Bubble Gum Yum and shot another zombie in the forehead. Fred then stuck the bubble gum in his pocket for later.

"I'm betting you guys want a shred of Fred, eh?" the young man wryly asked of the three zombies approaching down the beverage aisle. "Well, you don't get a shred of Fred, you get some lead in the head." He shot the first two zombies pointblank -- textbook headshots, perfectoundo, muy bien. But the third zombie dodged the third gunshot and lurched forward towards Fred, in close, and the survivor was forced to pull his machete and decapitate the undead monster to keep from being bitten and given an absolute death sentence.

Fred leaped over the three bodies and stuffed his pistol into his waistband as he grabbed a six-pack of grape soda, which had expired long, long ago, from their shelves in the beverage aisle. He tore the first one loose and shook it before cracking it open and spraying the aisle's already blood-slippery tile floor with expired grape soda. He did the same with the other five cans in the pack. Sure enough, here came another trio of zombies, turning sideways to go into the aisle -- and doing a perfect Three Stooges slip-and-fall act. One of the aptly-named Three Stooges, "Moe", tried to get up and did the splits with a horrifying crack of bone, which it didn't seem to notice.

Another grabbed that immobilized ghoul's head as leverage and tried to pull itself up mindlessly, but slipped sideways and knocked over one of the beverage shelves, flying into one of the toy shelves. The last zombie was struggling to get up, too, slipping and sliding again, whe a round from Fred's pistol ended his struggles. The survivor also put a bullet into "Moe," as well.

"I'm sorry, friend," he said, as if sad, to the twice-dead body. "But the auditions for Thriller were over back in the 80s. Michael Jackson's a child molestor now, kay?" Fred, still grinning, turned and walked up the un-slippery part of the beverage aisle. He needed to clear out the entire Lunch-and-Munch and take it over as a safehouse of sorts for survivors.

Fred walked through the aisles of the Lunch-and-Munch, shooting zombies and singing a little shred of a song he had made up about zombies. "I shot you bitch, I shot you dead, I killed you bitch with a shot to the head. Fuck you deadzed you already ate some lead!" "Hmm, actually isn't half bad . . . Meh . . . It's a work in progress, right?" Fred asked of an approaching zombie before putting a bullet through its eye.

"Graagggh . . . " A zombie lurched through a gap between shelves to Fred's right . . . actually directly to Fred's right, almost on top of him. Fred whirled and fumbled to bring his pistol up. The flowery dress-clad zombie tackled him back and Fred, zombie and shelf went flying everywhere with booming crashes.

Moans erupted all over the Lunch-and-Munch, alerted by the racket. But living things had been alerted, too, fortunately for Fred. As he struggled to keep the zombie from biting him, there was a loud boom and the back of the zombie's head caved in, blowing its face all over his. Fred spluttered and spat and knocked the twice-dead zombie off, standing up . . . To face five people, one with a smoking shotgun aimed at him, having just shot the zombie he had been struggling with.

"Um, hey . . . I'm Fred Bauker . . . " Fred said cautiously, not daring to look at his pistol, half-buried under a mountain of nearby cereal boxes, lest the people look in that direction, as well, and then steal his weapon, his only weapon.

"Albert Fowle," the gray-beard with the shotgun answered in a gravelly voice.

"Roseann Dopp . . . " said a woman to his right.

"Chasity Papas . . . " replied a woman to his left.

"Julian Landey," a man behind Chasity spoke up.

"Marcus Dangler," a man beside Julian said.

"Now that we're all introduced, what the fuck are you doing here?" Albert asked roughly, prodding Fred in the chest with the hot shotgun barrel.

"That's for me to know and for you never to find out, asswipe." Fred smiled charmingly at Roseann and Chasity and blinked as the younger Chasity winked back. She must have been only eighteen years old or so. Fred was like twenty-five . . . he thought so, anyways. Two fists grabbed him by the shirt and slammed him against one of the shelves still standing.

"Now, we haven't got much time to stand here and jaw meaninglessly, because the zombies are coming, okay? This asswipe doesn't like you and he hasn't even known you for a full minute, you catch? What the fuck are you doing here? I won't ask again!" Albert raged to the younger man.

Fred sighed. "I came here to loot your place and rape all your women," he lied.

Albert's eyes bugged. "What?"

"Yeah, that's right . . . " Fred said, still smiling widely.

Albert spluttered, trying to say something, but failing miserably.

"Nah, seriously dude . . . I just wanted to come here, clear out these zombies, board up the place, and chillax with all this food . . . " Fred replied. All the other survivors looked at him in silence.

"You are a very strange young man, aren't you?" Albert asked quietly, without anger. He had apparently deflated.

"You could say that," Fred answered, shrugging. "Now, let's clear out these zombies, if you don't mind . . . " He knelt and pulled his pistol from under the cereal boxes, checking the load and smiling at the survivors.


End file.
